The Waiting

The past two days have been some of the most darkest days in our lives here at the Signtopia home. Unfortunately, the worst is yet to come.......and it appears to be coming sooner rather than later. My wife's mom appears to have taken a sharp turn for the worse. She is no longer able to swallow.........cannot speak.....and is unable to eat or drink. Last night, she had eaten a meal that she had asked for.........a fish dinner from Long John Silver's. She enjoyed every bite of it.

Yesterday afternoon, I went to the airport to pick up my wife's sister. She flew in from Indiana earlier than she had planned because her mom had told her on the phone to "hurry". On the way home from the airport, I stopped by Long John Silver's to pick up a meal that my mother-in-law had been asking for since before Christmas. I am glad I managed to get it when I did because she hasn't been able to eat anything since. It's a hard thing to watch someone in the process of dying. This has been rough on everyone.....some seem to have been able to deal with it better than others. We have been hanging in there but it has been particularly tough for my wife.

The whole idea at this stage is to try everything to make her as comfortable as possible. Unfortunately, nothing can make the rest of us comfortable with the situation.

There will be no more pictures taken of her....this is the last one......and this was on Christmas Eve. She opened her presents and had a good time with the family around her. Today, she is nearly comatose. It is not a happy time here tonight.

She had said, in recent months, that she does not want to die at our house......that she does not want to put that kind of burden on our family again since we had already been through that experience with my father. We all want her here with us and we are stubborn enough that we will not accept any other options. This is the tough part...........waiting......and that feeling of having no control over anything. All we have at our disposal is the meds and alot of prayers.

Give your mom a hug today.